“As a child, I thought that life was the most horrible world that anyone could ever live in, and that there HAD to be something better”
I’ve been wanting to read this one for years and finally got around to checking it out from the library. First of all, it’s HUGE. Second of all, it’s really quite good!
SUMMARY: Wrapped in the landscape of a blustery Wisconsin winter, BLANKETS explores the sibling rivalry of two brothers growing up in the isolated country, and the budding romance of two coming-of-age lovers. A tale of security and discovery, of playfulness and tragedy, of a fall from grace and the origins of faith
Author/illustrator Craig Thompson takes us on an autobiographical journey through some of the defining coming-of-age moments in his child and teenage years. The main storyline of the book focuses on Craig meeting a girl at church camp around his senior year of high school, falling madly in love, and going to stay two weeks with her family. But there are also snippets of a storyline from when he and his brother were much younger.
This was such a lovely, tender, and heartbreaking story to read. Thompson does an incredible job of illustrating these compelling and often introspective moments of his childhood, and I could really feel the emotion coming off of the page. So realistic and relatable, I feel like I know these characters (and occasionally were some of these characters growing up). I love the moments when Craig plays with the medium, allowing moments of fantasy to reinforce the thoughts/feelings of the characters (below are some examples).
The only thing I didn’t like was the lack of full closure at the end. I get that’s how life is, and this just a snippet in his own, but there are things I still would have liked to known (including a very dark moment that was never explained)
Reading Vicariously 